Activity 11 - The Story of a Proton

Beginning with the Big Bang, create a time line that traces the full history of a proton that becomes a part of the nucleus of a carbon atom in you. (I would recommend making a diagram similar to the ones from slides 24 through 27 of Lecture 20. While you will not need to go into the future (of course), it provides a good starting point for the early universe, and may be a helpful guide to organization.)

7 or 8 events: 1. time begins: big bang 2. rapid inflation and expansion 3. 300,000 years: helium and hydrogen atoms formed 4. 1 billion years: gravity makes the gasses coalesce to form galaxies 5. approx 3 billion years: milky way forms 6. first stars begin to die and release elements that become new stars and planets 7. 10 billion years: solar system forms 8. 14 billion years: mankind

How might that proton have become part of one of the first stars?

After the formation of protons, neutrons, and electrons these particles came together to form hydrogen and helium. These gasses under the force of gravity came to form the clouds that become galaxies.

Suppose that proton later became part of a carbon atom in a 4 Msun star. Through what type of nebula would it have passed before returning to the interstellar medium?

Planetary nebula

In the Big Bang, how did a proton form?

Protons formed when the universe was cool enough to form them. After the big bang, the expanding hot soup of particles began to col as it grew. Quarks combined to form protons and neutrons soon after the universe was primarily dominated by radiation.

Suppose that carbon atom then became part of the molecular-cloud core forming the Sun and the Solar System. What two physical processes dominated the core's collapse as the Solar System formed and that carbon atom became part of a planet?

conservation of angular momentum that causes the disk to be created gravity